Skip to main content
Dessert

Sponge Pudding

A custard-based pudding made with sugar, flour, butter, milk, and eggs, baked in a water bath.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 5 ingredients
Jump to recipe ↓

Why it works: Butter and milk are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 7% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 81,283 recipes. Both carry (z)-4-heptenal, which smells biscuit, cream. The science ↓

Sponge Pudding

Ingredients

Directions

The book gives no oven temperature. The 350°F (175°C) in the steps was added when the recipe was transcribed, as a starting point.

Make the custard

  1. Combine sugar, flour, melted butter, and scalded milk in a saucepan.

  2. Cook over medium heat until it thickens into a custard.

  3. Allow to cool.

Bake and serve

  1. Beat the eggs separately.

  2. Fold the beaten eggs into the cooled custard just before baking.

  3. Pour the mixture into a baking dish that is set in a larger dish filled with water.

  4. Bake at 350°F (175°C) until set.

  5. Serve warm with hard sauce.

Recipe from a historical cookbook (Internet Archive).

Transcribed from a scanned cookbook and modernised for today's kitchens. Where the book gave no heat or time, or said "a moderate oven", the temperatures and times here may be modern equivalents rather than the book's own figures.

Explore the science

The flavor team

The pairs that carry this dish. Each one is judged two ways: how much their aromas overlap, and how often cooks already put them together.

  1. Butter + milktop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together81,283 recipes

    Shared aroma: (z)-4-heptenal (biscuit, cream).

  2. Flour + buttertop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together124,287 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  3. Flour + milktop 14% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together78,219 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  4. Sugar + flourtop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together92,116 recipes

    Shared aroma: phenylacetaldehyde (hawthorne, honey).

  5. Flour + eggtop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together106,462 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

Flour and butter barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 124,287 recipes: they work on texture and structure more than aroma.

Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs

What each ingredient does

Eggs
Beaten eggs add structure, setting the pudding as they cook into a sponge-like texture.
Flour
Thickens the milk mixture into a custard that gives the pudding body.
Milk
Forms the liquid base of the custard, adding moisture and richness.
Butter
Adds fat for richness and a tender crumb.
Sugar
Adds sweetness and helps balance the flavour of the custard.

The step that matters

Fold the beaten eggs into the cooled custard just before baking. Folding keeps the whipped eggs airy, so they rise and set the pudding. If the custard is still hot, the eggs can scramble, and if the batter sits too long the air is lost.

“What each ingredient does” and “The step that matters” were written by Claude from this recipe’s own method and reviewed in samples by CompKitchen.

More sponge pudding recipes

Steamed 7Chocolate 4Treacle 3 See all 120 →

You might also like

White CakeWhite Cake431 recipesPound CakePound Cake373 recipesOrange Bundt CakeOrange Bundt Cake349 recipesSpice CakeSpice Cake344 recipes